I survived Hurricane Katrina and I am seeing the exact same conditions again.

That's Misty McDaniel, a math teacher living in Asheville, North Carolina.

She was living in Baton Rouge when Katrina hit in 2005 and she went to New Orleans as a volunteer to help those in need. Nearly 20 years later

she feels a sense of deja vu over Hurricane Helene. Streets and houses have washed away. Millions of people don't have power.

We have very limited communication networks. Our cell phone towers and communications basically

collapse. They actually did collapse. We had no cell phone

service on Friday. We had no cell phone service on Saturday.

Asheville is in the mountains where hurricanes and flooding were not something most people worried about.

The city is known for its thriving arts and music scene.

Now many residents are searching for basic essentials.

I just want to state how much our worlds have shrunk to the daily survival needs of trying

to find water, drinking water, toilet water, and drinking water, toilet water, and water to wash your dishes in.

It's become all-consuming, trying to figure out where do you need to go,

what store might be open.

Consider this. The effort to recover from Hurricane Helene is only beginning.

Coming up, we'll look at the road ahead. From NPR I'm Ari Shapiro.

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